MakerFaire K.C. sneak peak at ArcAttack’s new toy

I’ve been seeing videos of ArcAttack all over the web for several years now and hoped one day I’d be able to cross paths with them. When I heard they were going to be at MakerFaire K. C., I was determined to grab them and ask a few questions. As it turns out, they’re fans of Hackaday and were happy to talk. Not only that, but when I was asking what fun things they were building, their eyes lit up. “You’re going to love this” one of them said as he ran off behind the stage. He returned with a device which was strapped to his body and spitting 5 foot long lightning bolts. He was right, I did love it! They demonstrated this proton pack looking portable tesla coil for a while, shocking each other and random bits of metal, all the wile grinning like the fools we all are.

I know we’ve covered a portable tesla coil or two before, but seeing this thing in person,heading right for you,strapped to someone who might actually even be able to run faster than you, is pretty cool.

There is video (sorry, shaky) and a ton of pictures after the break. Enjoy.

It looks like you can get a few cool pictures of an earlier stage of the handheld tesla coil from their Facebook page as well.

They just finished this only a couple of weeks ago. I thought about submitting the photos Steve posted to Facebook, but I’m glad HAD ran into them instead. This type of coil is particularly interesting, it has a different operating mode than the stage coils, I’m surprised it wasn’t mentioned.